The Old Rifle Sonja's Father Left Behind

The Old Rifle Sonja's Father Left Behind is the object Ove chooses for a private plan to die, but it does not remain private for long. Its movement from the attic to a hiding place, and then into the hall, tracks a night in which Ove’s preparations are repeatedly diverted by the needs and presence of others. When Adrian and Mirsad arrive, the rifle turns an ordinary request for shelter into a confrontation, and their arrival interrupts the course Ove had intended for the day.

Identity and Place in the House

The rifle is identified as the old hunting rifle belonging to Sonja’s father. Ove fetches it from the attic the morning he has decided that his aversion to weapons is outweighed by the emptiness left by Sonja in their quiet home. The evidence gives no account of when or why her father acquired it; in this episode, its importance comes from its presence in the house and from the purpose Ove assigns it.

That purpose makes the rifle an unusual object in Ove’s domestic routine. It is not part of the familiar work of repairing, maintaining, or organizing the home. He instead treats it as equipment for a decision he has already made. Yet even as he tries to keep the plan orderly, the house and its inhabitants complicate it: first Parvaneh comes to the door, and later the cat’s routines and possible reactions shape what Ove does with the rifle.

Retrieval and Concealment

After letting That Stray Cat outside, Ove brings the rifle down from the attic. He intends to use it after breakfast, having arranged the morning around the cat’s usual time outdoors. When Parvaneh arrives unexpectedly and presses her telephone on him so he can speak with a journalist, Ove hides the rifle behind the radiator rather than let her see it and interfere. The concealment is practical, but it also shows how quickly his solitary plan is forced to accommodate an unplanned visitor.

Later, after dinner and television, Ove waits for the cat to settle on Sonja’s side of the bed before retrieving the rifle from behind the radiator. He has brought four heavy-duty tarpaulins in from the toolshed and concealed them in the broom cupboard. He tapes them to the hall walls, choosing the room because it has the smallest surface area and, as he reasons, will leave less to clean. His preparations are methodical, down to arranging his funeral instructions and clothes, but the rifle itself remains something he does not know well. The episode gives the object a place inside a careful domestic procedure without making Ove’s familiarity with it part of that procedure.

The Rifle and the Nighttime Interruption

The cat changes Ove’s preparations once more. Before proceeding, he realizes the sound might frighten it awake. He sets the rifle down and turns on the radio, hoping that if the cat hears a sudden noise it might mistake it for part of a song. When he returns to the hall, however, the broadcast is local news rather than music. A warning about burglary rings operating around town catches his attention; Ove listens and grips the rifle more firmly.

Soon afterward, Adrian and Mirsad approach Ove’s front door. Hearing their steps in the snow and having just heard the burglary report, Ove assumes they may be intruders. Wearing only socks and underwear, he opens the door with the rifle in his hands. Adrian panics, and Ove’s alarm at the noise turns immediately toward keeping the cat asleep. In the confusion, Mirsad explains that they are not there to burgle the house. Their purpose is to ask whether he can stay there because they have nowhere else to go.

The rifle remains between the men as Ove initially refuses the request. When Adrian moves toward him, Ove raises it; Mirsad steps in and gently turns the barrel away. Ove then lowers the weapon. The object has not been fired, but its presence has changed the encounter: a request for temporary shelter begins under the threat of a misunderstanding, then shifts as Mirsad explains their situation and Ove recognizes where he is and what is happening.

Consequence and Significance

As Ove steps back into the hall, he notices the photograph of Sonja on the wall: she is wearing a red dress on their bus trip to Spain, when she was pregnant. Ove had repeatedly wanted the photograph taken down, while Sonja had insisted that it was a memory worth keeping. The rifle and the photograph thus occupy the same moment in the house: one belongs to the action Ove had planned, the other recalls a shared life and Sonja’s attachment to its memories. The encounter does not erase his grief, but it interrupts his preparations and brings that remembered relationship sharply into view.

By the next morning, the outcome is not the one Ove had arranged. Instead of dying, he wakes with That Stray Cat and a bent person living in his row house. The rifle’s role in this reversal is indirect but decisive: it is the means Ove has selected, the concealed object Parvaneh must not see, and the weapon that makes him mistake Adrian and Mirsad for burglars. Their arrival redirects the night from a solitary plan toward an unexpected obligation to other people. The rifle remains associated with Ove’s despair, but its appearance also marks the point at which the outside world enters the house and changes what happens next.